Donor Spotlight: Petmate

The Robovikes are excited to have Petmate as a sponsor for the 2016-2017 season! On September 29th, Jack DeRuntz, David Yokell, Alejandro Araujo, Dr. Scheer, and Mr. Depta visited Petmate’s headquarters for a marketing presentation with CEO Alice Tillett and Executive VP of Operations John DeRuntz.

Petmate, a Doskocil manufacturing company designs and manufactures pet products for some of the largest pet retailers in the country. Petmate manufactures a lot of their products in Arlington Texas, and also partners with manufacturers in Vietnam and China. Petmate has many brands including Chuckit!, Jackson galaxy, JW, Dogzilla, Aspen Pet, Mutt Nation, and WWE branded products. Petmate is a leading manufacturer in air kennels, but also manufactures products ranging from small cat toys to large dog toys.

This is the first time that Petmate has sponsored a robotics team and has never been to a robotics tournament before. “Out of the many options that a corporation has to reinvest into the community, we have considered and decided that an investment in activities that supports critical thinking, collaborative design ideas, and building alliances and relationships provides a return on our investment.” said John DeRuntz “We support the growth of Science, Technology and Engineering talent at Nolan Catholic. We enjoy watching the collaboration of young minds through the design and development of their robots. We are impressed with their energy, collaboration, and pride towards their hard work. We are excited to see technology and competition combined in FIRST Robotics” The Robovikes is excited that they will be visiting Petmate again in the Christmas season to present to them the demoBOT with a “Christmas twist” to it!